Getting Spirited Away in JiuFen

Summary
Jiufen is very cute. With its narrow lanes, ornamental crafted roofs and whimsical tea houses, it’s no wonder Hayao Miyazaki was inspired to make the famous Japanese animated movie Spirited Away here. Very much worth the time to make a day trip from Taipei. Just two main tips:
- Try to stay overnight, or at least arrive super early in the morning – the place gets very crowded, especially considering the narrow streets, by around mid to late morning. Yet you’ll have it to yourself in the early morning and evening
- Make sure to climb nearby Mount Keelung – its only half an hour or so to reach the summit, and the walk through the long flowing grass and views down on Jiufen and the surrounding area from the top make it a great option. Plus, it is less busy once the day tourists arrive in Jiufen
highlights

#1 The sheer cuteness of the place that inspired the movie Spirited Away

#2 Walking to the summit of nearby Mount Keelung. Only 30mins to the top and great views of Jiufen and its surrounding areas

#3 The food! Perfect place to sample endless dumplings in a variety of tea and dumpling houses

#4 Wandering through the atmospheric street in the evenings, when most of the crowds have gone and you feel a bit more of the charm of this super cool spot
Experiences nearby

The below map shows experiences nearby with a colour that reflect the Overall Score of those experiences
Score Detail
Background - how many times have you asked someone what a travel experience was like and the response was "amazing" or "awesome"? That response is nice to know, but it makes it hard to differentiate that experience compared to others. That is exactly what these scores are trying to do - differentiate the experience by giving a score out of 10 based on 6 categories and then giving an overall experience score
This overall experience score is calculated by: take the highest of the "Culture" or "Nature" score (1-10) + "Fun factor" (1-10) + "Avoiding the crowds" (1-10) + highest of the "Unique" or "World Famous score" (1-10). Then convert into a score out of 100
Extra detail - the logic being that I find all of the 6 individual scores important, but I don't want to mark an experience down just because it doesn't cover both "Culture" and "Nature", or because it isn't both "World Famous" and "Unique". Take the examples of Safari in The Serengeti and walking through Rome - they both appeal at opposite ends of the nature / culture spectrum, and you can have a fantastic time without needing to appeal to both sides. So, their overall scores aren't penalized for their lack of one or the other, and I've done the same for "World Famous" vs "Unique". But . . . I do think that the "Fun factor" of an experience is important, irrelevant of other factors, and so is "Avoiding the Crowds" (or where there are crowds that add to the experience). So, both of these scores are standalone